Santa delivered for many national and local retailers, after a lackluster early holiday season gave way to a post-Christmas surge. Twenty retailers reported that revenue at stores open at least a year — a figure that indicates a retailer's health — rose an average of 4.5 percent in December compared with a year ago. [Source: Tampa Bay Times]

Everglades restoration projects start moving

Everglades restoration projects, which have been in the planning stages for a decade and may cost well over $8 billion, are moving forward in 2013, and more than $2 billion of ecological projects are either under way or approved for this region. [Source: Fort Myers News-Press]

State inks deal to privatize South Florida inmate health care

Gov. Rick Scott's administration announced Thursday the state has signed a contract with a Pennsylvania company, Wexford Health Sources, to outsource medical care to more than 15,000 inmates in several South Florida prisons. [Source: Times/Herald]

Private company developing commercial lunar lander

A private company that hopes to land paying customers on the moon has hired the builder of the first human landers to start designing a modern version. Boulder, Co.-based Golden Spike Co., headed by former NASA executives, will work with Northrop Grumman Corp. on the preliminary design for a commercially flown lunar lander. [Source: Florida Today]

Red tide has tourism industry on edge

Uncertainty is hovering over tourism businesses across Southwest Florida as prime season kicks off with a large red tide bloom lingering offshore from Tampa Bay to Naples. Scientists say there is no way to predict whether the toxic algae bloom will stick around for months and sour tourism or quickly vanish. [Source: Sarasota Herald-Tribune]

› Python purge: Florida contest turns public loose in Everglades [FOX News] The Sunshine State is hosting a month-long “Python Challenge" beginning Jan.12 with cash prizes of up to $1,500 for the biggest snakes caught. Wildlife officials urge caution, but beyond the online course and the fee, there are no other requirements to hunt down the Burmese pythons, which can reach nearly 18 feet in length and have devastated much of the southern Florida ecosystem.

› Police teach businesses to be alert for bomb-making plots[South Florida Sun-Sentinel] Anyone who wants to make a bomb can find instructions on the Internet. But local law enforcement says it's trying to prevent access to the components and chemicals a terrorist would need to inflict such mayhem.

› Wind industry tax credit extended in fiscal compromise[Palm Beach Post] A one-year extension of an energy tax credit passed this week is a relief to the wind industry and is likely to benefit wind giants from NextEra Energy Resources to a smaller company planning a wind farm in western Palm Beach County.